@OhKayEl
The N64 emulation has been so bad for so long people have jumped straight to making native PC ports 🤣
@kered13
It's kind of crazy that we have nearly perfect Gamecube and Wii emulation, but N64 emulation is still so challenging.
@Zye1984
Im hearing a lot about how emulation doesn't work but not about WHY the N64 is so hard to emulate.
@DerekTurtleRoe
Project64 contributor here. Just so everybody knows, we are working on removing a lot of hacks from the core as well increasing the accuracy of the core. There are currently a handful of contributors and a lot of them have full time jobs and family. I don't, but I've been very busy lately. Having said that, a lot of progress was made on the CPU, RSP, and the ROM database in 2024. I've also been working on updating dependencies and we are trying to get the core working on Android and eventually Linux as well. I've already ported the build system to CMake, we just need to rebuild the UI and it should compile on Linux. It plays all games now, and most homebrew and test ROMs work. We put a lot of effort into Project64 last year, and I'll be putting just as much effort into it this year (if not more). I also contributed to several other N64 emulators last year, and I've been working on my awesome emulators list, so some of my busy days have been my fault for sure. But it has been a great year with a lot of progress in N64 emulation. Side note: proper testing of Daedalus is on my list of things to tackle at some point. 😄
@BenLiuChungHin
Not sure if people old enough to remember the original N64 emulator (UltraHLE) that caused a massive storm since it was released in the early days of N64 and was basically doing on-the-fly calls to 3DFx's GLIDE (and then modded later to work with the full OpenGL set). This was considered revolutionary considering the emulator was released in 1999 while the N64 was released in 1997. Considering the PC standards back then was literally a Pentium 2/3 and 3DFX was still the standard, they did such an excellent job of emulating this. Super surprised that 26 years later, we "still don't have it right" with hardware that is 100x more powerful than back then.
@boazplays7239
I tried playing Majoras Mask many years ago in Project64. I got horribly stuck somewhere and couldn't figure out how to progress. So I set it down and played Ocarina of Time instead... but also got completely stuck in the Deku Tree. Turns out that the climbable vines texture wasn't rendering and I had no idea I was supposed to climb up (apparently blank) walls.
@SpamNapkin
A few years ago I decided to play Pokemon Snap on an emulator because I was feeling nostalgic and hadn't played it in over 20 years. But when Professor Oak graded my performance he couldn't detect a single Pokemon in ANY of the pictures I took, even when they were right in the center of the frame. Occasionally he'd spot one but it was really hit or miss. My first thought was "Damn, this game is way harder than I remember." and it got to the point that I seriously believed this game that I remembered being really chill and easy was actually insanely hard and I repressed the memory because it was too traumatic. Turns out it was a glitch exclusive to the emulator I was using. When I played the Wii Virtual Console version through Dolphin it ran perfectly. But I was seriously pulling my hair out.
@tylerdurden783
9:33 To be fair, lots of N64 games (especially Goldeneye) do not run at 60fps on the actual console. Goldeneye couldn't even maintain 30 natively.
@GoodMomo
So happy that a large content creator has mentioned there are issues with the NSO version of FZero X. If anyone is wondering what they are, the game basically runs at a higher framerate than the original (IIRC, the original was something like 59.5 fps) so the CPU is always trying to catch up which causes the constant framedrops you see on NSO.
@RoccocoVs
Emulating Super Mario 64 in 1999 was a time
@LuigiBlood
In my opinion the big reason why N64 emulation is a broken mess: There's no proper graphics plugin that isn't parallel-rdp. RT64 is potentially getting there but it isn't ready for emulators just yet. GLideN64 doesn't just work. High compatibility with emulated games to some extent, but poor compatibility with low spec systems. If it gets a DirectX backend that would actually change though at least for low spec Windows systems (happens way more than you think). As soon as this is changed, then you can finally actually start offering a decent N64 emulator setup. The problem isn't all about accuracy (though, thankfully, we're getting somewhere now), the problem is about how it is not easy to use just because of reasons like this. For me the problem about N64 NSO is not about having the most accurate emulation, because we're on Switch, the problem is about how everything else is terribly managed. Poor control setup, poor graphics emulation, which reminder, it's using Vulkan, for me all they did was porting the Wii U GX2 renderer to Vulkan with barely any improvements ever since. I don't think there's any proper use of Vulkan's specifics to help N64 emulation like RT64 and parallel-rdp did. Other problems are also how N64 NSO started with an unreliable feel and that didn't really quite stop since. They still haven't figured out 3-point filtering. I still do not understand why this isn't implemented.
@ShadowTasos
The main issue with N64 emulation on the Switch is the fucking insane input lag. I thought I was going crazy, there's no way the games are that laggy, so I actually plugged in my N64 just to check and holy shit it's insane how bad the input lag is on the Switch. If you have never played N64 games before you might think that's just how games were back then, they were laggy, but no it was actually the other way around - controls are SO snappy on the N64, that when you go on to play them again on the Switch you're like WTF.
@sytsma.justin
I remember emulating N64 games as a teenager 20+ years ago and wondered why some of the games became unplayable (particularly Paper Mario).Still shocking all these years later that it hasn't fully been solved. I've settled on getting a flash cart for my N64 on a CRT :)
@azazelleblack
I was surprised at the title of this video because I've been emulating N64 across a wide range of titles for years now with few issues. However, It's true that I'm using the latest software with a very powerful desktop gaming PC. I do feel it's necessary to point out that Mupen64Plus-Next works excellently as a libretro core within RetroArch, even on relatively low-power x86-64 machines like the ASUS ROG Ally. With that said, even that system is miles more powerful than a PS Vita, PS4, or Raspberry Pi (yes, even the 5.)
@ogto
n64 is a sore spot but i'm still hoping for greater leaps in saturn emulation. a lot more quality forgotten games collecting dust on that console...
@MofoMan2000
Zilmar is still working on Project64, and I believe he and his team are focusing very hard on accuracy. I don't know exactly where they are in their roadmap but it's always interesting to see what they're doing.
@audreygore
Ive been struggling to find a solution for 64 emulation for so long. You've just convinced me to go back to the OG hardware
@cmedtheuniverseofcmed8775
Being a long term emulator enthusiast, I know that Project64 has been long going. It's true that the emulation hasn't been perfect, although it has gotten better over time. It isn't just N64, but consoles such as Sega Saturn's Emulation that suffers from the lack of unity in its creation. The Saturn is very difficult to emulate as it often deals with 2D and 3D graphics from multiple companies/designs. I don't flaw anybody as I know it's a challenge to overcome. MAME is another good example of overcoming the vast array of arcades that have come and gone. If anything, I praise everyone's hard work to save these games from oblivion. With all that said, there has been signifcant progress accross all emulation. I originally hadn't touched it for over 10 years and can see a dramatic difference today. MAME and Duckstation have made leaps and bounds. Not only that, but there's been considerable effort by the fan community to translate or mod games that were never sold to other countries. We can only hope that this trend continues in unearthing those hidden gems.
@theshadowdirector
Got to say, the N64 version of The World is Not Enough is seriously underrated, it took a lot of cues from Goldeneye and is probably one of the closest things you can play to a follow-up alongside Perfect Dark. Would be great if that could get any sort of re-release down the line but we know how difficult MGM have been about appreciating old school 007 games.
@KazeN64